To Not Strangle the One You Love
by Evil Cosmic Triplets
Summary: Steve and Danny are checking out a building, after hours, as a favor for a friend of the governor's. Danny gets the feeling that they are not alone. Is it paranoia or is something fishy going on? (Written as a Christmas gift for Swifters)


**Disclaimer:** I do not own the characters of this work of fiction, and no profit, monetary or otherwise, is being made through the writing of this.

 **A/N:** Happy Christmas, Swifters. While this does not have everything you asked for, I tried to work in most aspects, and fluff and angst decided to tag along, as well as hurt, but BAMF Danny, and slightly insecure, yet protective Steve. Mele Kalikimaka!

* * *

"Are you sure we're alone in this building?" Danny asked, again, for the tenth time (not that Steve was counting).

Steve gritted his teeth, and tamped down on the urge he had to strangle the man he loved.

Instead, he said, "Yes, Danno, I'm sure." He dangled the keys to the building in front of Danny's face, and gave his partner a toothy grin. Keys that had been given to them by the man who owned the building.

"There _is_ more than one set of keys to this building," Danny said, and he shoved Steve's hand out of his face.

Sighing, Steve ran a hand through his hair. "The sooner we finish this, the sooner we get to go home and watch that game we DVR'd."

Danny pursed his lips, but nodded. "You're right. I just...there's something not quite right about this place."

"Which is why we're checking it out." Steve jiggled the handle of a door that led to Mr. Gordon's office, and, finding it locked, he searched the key chain for the right key.

"There's something not right about this place," Danny repeated.

"Danny, we already know that something's going on. We wouldn't be here, checking this place out as a favor for the governor's friend if there wasn't something 'not right'," Steve reminded his partner.

This wasn't even a proper case, and Steve doubted that they'd find anything amiss, but they'd agreed to check it out to reassure the governor's friend that his company's assets were well protected, and that Mr. Gordon was not, in fact, robbing him blind by siphoning funds out of the company's business accounts. In retrospect, Steve realized that he probably should have brought Chin along for this, but he'd not wanted to bother the other man so close to the holidays, and, if was being truthful, he enjoyed checking out leads with Danny.

Steve found the right key and smiled as he held it up for Danny to see. Rolling his eyes, Danny gestured for Steve to move it along, though he cast his gaze behind them and shivered.

"You hear something?" Steve asked.

Shaking his head, Danny shrugged. "No, just...this place is giving me the creeps. It feels like someone's watching us."

He shivered again, and snatched the key from Steve's hand. Shoving it into the lock, he pushed the door open, and, in his haste, nearly fell headlong into the room. He righted himself, and stuffed the keys into his pocket, brushing the front of his shirt off as though to compose himself.

"Places like this can be spooky," Steve conceded, following Danny into the office.

"Especially after hours, in the dark." Another reason he was happy to have Danny, rather than Chin with him. Not that they were going to do anything, together, in the dark that wasn't related to the task at hand.

He didn't feel any eyes on them, and chalked Danny's nervousness up to the dark interior of the building, and the eerie shadows that were being caused by the light of the almost full moon.

"Let's just do this and get out of here," Danny said. "You really think we're going to find any evidence of foul play in this, Mr. Gordon's office?"

He flipped the light switch near the door, bathing the room in a dim fluorescent glow. The light flickered, and Danny moved stiffly into the room, stopping abruptly after taking only a few steps.

"No idea, but the governor's friend seems to think Mr. Gordon is doing something illegal, and..." Steve trailed off at the same time that Danny let out a strangled half-scream, and backed into Steve.

"Fuck...shit...goddamn," Steve swore.

He moved to stand in front of Danny, as though doing so could shield his partner from the gruesome sight that he'd come face to crotch with when he entered the room in front of Steve. Steve inserted himself between Danny and the dead man's body, which hung from a support beam in the ceiling.

The man's shoes had been removed and placed neatly together underneath his dangling body. They sat on top of a pile of what Steve assumed was the dead man's clothing. The only articles of clothing that the man was left wearing were a pair of black socks that came up to mid-calf on him; boxers adorned in red hearts; and a tie, which had been used as a makeshift noose around his neck.

The man's eyes were open and bulging out of his skull, like a bullfrog's. His mouth was open, too, and his face was frozen in a look of abject horror, giving Steve the impression that this had not been a suicide, but rather murder.

"How much you want to bet that that's Mr. Gordon?" Danny asked after a pause. Swallowing thickly, he rubbed a hand over his face, and kept his eyes downcast.

"Looks like we're going to have to call HPD," Steve said. _And we won't be watching the DVR'd game anytime soon, he thought morosely._

He turned his back on the dead man, and faced his partner. Danny was a little pale and shaky. Steve frowned. This wasn't Danny's first time dealing with death. Sure, it hadn't been what they'd been expecting when they'd entered the office building, but Danny's reaction was a little extreme, given everything else that the man had been through over the years.

"You alright, Danno?" Steve moved toward his partner, and placed a hand on his elbow. "You wanna get out of here? Phone HPD from another office?"

Danny shook his head. "No, I'm fine. I just...Steve, we're not alone. I can't explain how I know it. There's just this...itching feeling between my shoulder blades." Danny reached behind his back and scratched at the phantom itch. His whole body seemed to shiver in response.

"Steve, we _need_ to get out of here," Danny whispered, once again looking over his shoulder, out into the dark corridor they'd just left.

Steve nodded. Keeping one hand on Danny's elbow, he reached for his weapon with the other. Steve had no idea what was spooking Danny; he wasn't feeling the itch between the shoulders that his partner was, but he knew better than to doubt Danny's instincts. Most of the time, they were right on the money.

Danny was a damn good detective, and Steve had learned, the hard way, to trust what his partner's gut was saying, no matter what the evidence said to the contrary. Every time he'd questioned Danny's instincts, something bad had happened. And with just the two of them in this building, other than the spooky other presence that Danny kept mentioning, and the dead man, Steve wasn't willing to take any risks.

If it was just himself here, Steve wouldn't mind taking the risk, whatever it was, but he refused to put Danny's life on the line. Now, or ever.

"Okay," Steve said. "We'll leave; come back with HPD and the others. Launch a proper investigation."

"Did you hear that?" Danny asked, eyes widening, head turning in the direction of a noise that only he could hear.

Shaking his head, Steve frowned at his partner. "I didn't hear anything. Danny, do you think -"

"Shh!" Danny pressed a hand to Steve's chest and a finger to his lips, and he turned and walked toward the door, placing one ear near the opening.

"Listen," he hissed. He quirked his head in the direction they'd come from, eyes narrowing as he listened to something that Steve _still_ couldn't hear even though he threw his all into listening, for Danny, as much as for the sake of the man whose body was swinging idly from the ceiling.

At first, that's all that Steve heard - the creaking of the body swinging back and forth behind him; the strain of the wood and metal that the body was attached to as the ceiling started to buckle beneath the man's weight.

He hadn't been a large man in life, but the ceiling was not equipped to hold dead weight for a prolonged period, and it was only a matter of time before it gave way, and the body fell. Steve wanted to get the body down before gravity did the work for them, but Danny's phantom noise was taking precedence for the time being, and the body could wait a few more minutes.

"Danny?" Steve whispered into his partner's ear, only to earn a glare from the man whose muscles were strung tauter than the skin of a snare drum beneath Steve's hand.

"There," Danny whispered harshly. "Did you hear that?"

Steve leaned closer to the door, and, inadvertently Danny, who was wedged between the wall and the door, one ear toward the opening, listening. The heady scent of Danny's cologne, mixed with sweat was almost overpowering, standing this close to the man, and made Steve think of other ways that he'd rather be spending time with his partner tonight. None of which involved listening for nonexistent sounds while a dead man swung from the ceiling by a polka-dotted tie.

Sighing, Steve opened his mouth to tell Danny that he was letting his imagination get the best of him, that there was no one else there besides the two of them and the dead man at their back, when he heard it, too.

The sound, whatever it was, was almost imperceptible, and Steve held his breath, waiting to hear the sound again, because as soon as he'd heard it, it had stopped, almost as though it was aware that it had been heard.

Steve shook himself. Maybe he was just borrowing some of Danny's paranoia. The hairs on the back of his neck begged to differ, though, as they stood on end, and his skin prickled with some unnameable fear.

Danny was holding his breath, too, lips smashed together in a thin line, knuckles white around his weapon, which was clutched tightly in his right hand. Danny's muscles were bunched together, tight beneath Steve's hand. He was poised to jump out into the corridor and face whoever, or whatever, was making that noise in the hallway.

Steve and Danny exhaled at the same time, bodies in perfect sync with each other in a way that spoke of the many years they'd been working together. It came as second nature to the both of them to follow each others' lead. Steve followed Danny's now, as the man placed a finger over his lips for the second time that night. Steve closed his eyes, straining his ears to listen in silence, tuning out the creaking of the wood behind him, and the sound of his partner's and his own breathing.

It came again. The sound. More certain now. A footstep, if Steve wasn't mistaken. Made by a hard soled boot, or one of those fancy dress shoes, like the pair that Danny'd forced him to wear to Grace's Christmas recital the other week.

There were so many other things that he and Danny should be doing right now, Steve couldn't help thinking as he waited for Danny to telegraph their next move.

Getting the house ready for Grace and Charlie to spend Christmas through New Year's with them was just one of them. Buying last minute Christmas presents for their team members was another. Wrapping gifts for each other. Decorating the tree. Walking through their neighborhood, hand-in-hand, looking at the Christmas lights, and taking pictures with their phones, sending them to family members. Making fools of themselves underneath mistletoe. Snuggling on the couch together beneath a blanket, watching Christmas specials while drinking eggnog. Kissing.

Another footstep, and Danny held his fingers up in front of Steve's face, mouthed, 'On the count of three,' and started the countdown.

Steve's palms were sweaty. He could hear his own heartbeat, could feel Danny's muscles bunch as they tightened beneath the hand that he'd rested on Danny's shoulder as Danny readied to move.

Everything happened in slow motion, but far too quickly for Steve to follow as Danny slipped out from beneath his hand, and into the corridor. Dropping to a knee, he rolled to the other side of the hallway, gun held high, and pointing at what appeared to be a ghostly figure standing in the middle of the hallway, back-lit by moonlight which streamed in through a lone window. The man seemed to be glowing, and Steve had to blink to clear his mind, because, clearly it was playing tricks on him, and Danny needed him.

Steve was a step, maybe two behind his partner, the strange man in his sights, even as Danny surged upward, gun held in front of him and confronted their ghostly intruder. "Five-0, lower your weapon and put your hands up!"

The man didn't listen though, he took another step forward, toward Danny, holding something in his hand that glittered silver in the moonlight.

Steve's heart jumped up into his throat when a gunshot rang out, reverberating off of the walls, deafening in the confining space. It was impossible for him to tell whose weapon had gone off, if anyone had been hit. He felt as though he was trapped in a quagmire, sinking, limbs stiff and uncooperative as he tried, but failed to make it across the small space to Danny. His tongue was stuck to the roof of his dry mouth. He couldn't even call out to his partner.

Danny dropped to the floor of the hallway, the intruder falling with him. There was a scuffle, Danny's gun, and that of the man he fought with, both skittered down the hallway, out of reach of both men, and out of Steve's sight. Steve wasn't sure which of the two dark figures to train his own weapon on when he'd finally regained the use of his limbs.

He could hear flesh coming into contact with flesh, meaty fists slamming into whatever bit of flesh that they could reach as the two men fought each other for dominance, bruising livers, breaking bones, doing untold damage to each other in the darkness. Steve felt powerless, and angry with both his partner and the man he was fighting against.

"Five-0!" Steve shouted when his tongue finally loosened, and he was once more capable of speech.

It wasn't much, and Steve doubted that either man heard him over the combined sounds of their grunts and muttered curses. He hated this. Feeling useless. It should be _him_ down there fighting for his life, not Danny.

Steve fumbled around in the hallway, looking for a light switch. There wasn't one. At least not in this section of the hallway. Cursing, Steve stormed back toward his partner and the man that he was fighting, his stomach clenching when he realized that one of the men was down for the count, the other struggling to sit upright.

Steve let out the breath he was holding when Danny sat up, victorious. In the light of the moon, Danny's head appeared to be wreathed in a shimmering halo of silver.

"You, my friend are under arrest." Danny was winded, but he was grinning, the intruder pinned beneath him, hands rucked up behind his back, and already in cuffs. "You have the right to remain silent, should you choose to exercise that right, and, under the circumstances, I would strongly advise it..."

Steve tuned out the rest of Danny reading the man his Miranda Rights in favor of phoning HPD and finding the damn light switch, as well as his partner's and the intruder's lost weapons. He'd worked himself up into a rant worthy of Danny by the time that he'd found the lightswitch and the missing weapons.

Two hours, and a burgeoning headache later, and the man, who had, in fact killed Mr. Gordon, and three other employees, was in police custody. Apparently he'd been fired a few weeks ago, and blamed it on the men he'd killed. He was planning on going after the governor's friend after he'd framed the men who'd allegedly framed him, and gotten him fired. The man was completely off his rocker.

Danny was being looked at by paramedics who advised him to go to the hospital to get his cracked ribs and facial contusions looked at, but Danny waved their concerns off, promising to go to the ER if he experienced dizziness or shortness of breath.

Once more, Steve found himself having to tamp down on the urge he had to strangle the man he loved, but for vastly different reasons than he had earlier. Jaw and hands clenched, Steve paced behind the ambulance while he waited for the paramedics to finish working on Danny. They'd already taken care of the man Danny had arrested.

Refusing to meet Danny's eye when the paramedics finished working on him, Steve led the way to his truck, more than ready to call it a day, crawl into bed - with Danny banned to the couch - and sleep.

The Governor's promise of a full week off hadn't been worth this, Steve couldn't help but think as he stole furtive glances at Danny's swollen face. They hadn't spoken a word to each other, just crawled into the truck and headed home, in silence. Danny was sore, and exhausted, his head resting against the passenger window, eyes closed, arms wrapped protectively around his middle.

Steve knew that he wasn't being fair to Danny. That his anger wasn't as justified as he'd like to think it was.

How many times had it been him sitting in the passenger's seat, Danny driving because he'd been injured when he'd jumped headfirst into a situation, throwing all caution to the wind, like Danny had tonight? And, sure, Danny had chewed him out all of those times, but, in the end, he'd made sure that Steve got home alright. That he was taken care of.

Taking a deep breath, and letting it out, along with some of the frustration and impotence that he'd felt tonight when Danny had been fighting for his life, Steve reached over and placed a hand on Danny's thigh. Squeezing gently, he said the first words that came to mind. Words that he hadn't planned on saying, but words that were, nonetheless true.

"You could have been killed."

What he'd wanted to say, in his anger - _If you ever pull another stunt like that again, I'll kill you myself; what would I tell Grace and Charlie if their Danno died? How do you expect me to go on living without you by my side? Who would have my back then, huh, Danny?_ \- remained, thankfully, unspoken. He wasn't half as good at chewing someone out as Danny was. Words weren't his strength. Neither was patience, or being sidelined like he'd been tonight.

"I know," Danny said, voice tight. "I'm sorry, Steve. I know what I did tonight was stupid. If you'd have done what I did, I...would've torn you a new one. You'd definitely be in the doghouse tonight, so I understand if you'd rather that I -"

Steve cut the rest of Danny's self-chastisement off by placing his hand over Danny's mouth, only removing it when Danny stopped sputtering and licked his hand. Danny met his gaze through the rearview mirror, eyes filled with remorse, and something that Steve had only just recently began to recognize as love.

Shaking his head, Steve wiped his hand off on Danny's knee, and they both laughed, tension bleeding away as Danny drew Steve's hand to his mouth and kissed the palm he'd licked.

"I'd promise not to do something like that again," Danny said, twining their fingers together. "But we both know that that's not a promise either of us can keep."

"Yeah," Steve agreed.

Knowing the truth of Danny's words didn't make them any easier to accept. Maybe if they lived different lives where danger wasn't lurking around every corner, they could say those words and mean them. They didn't.

"You still angry with me, babe?" Danny asked as they pulled into the driveway. He had one eye open and trained on Steve. "Will I be sleeping on the couch tonight?"

"I _should_ make you sleep on the couch tonight, but you'd probably be too stiff in the morning to be of much help around the house," Steve said, not yet ready to let go of remaining spark of anger, but wanting to keep Danny close, because, for a minute, or two...for what had felt like an eternity of hell...he'd thought that he was going to lose him. "In case you've forgotten, we're going to have a full house for Christmas and New Years."

Danny groaned, but smiled. "Grace and Charlie. You're sure you're okay with them invading your place?"

" _Our_ place, Danny, and yeah, I'm okay with it," Steve said, voice a little more gruff than he'd intended it to be. He parked the truck, got out and held the door open for Danny, helping him down from the truck, mindful of his bruises and cracked ribs.

It shouldn't bother him that Danny still felt a little unsure about the direction their relationship had taken, and that he felt like he had to ask if things like having Grace and Charlie over was alright; that he still referred to the home that he shared with Steve, as Steve's, but it did. It hurt him in a way that Steve hadn't thought possible, and he wasn't sure how to handle that. Or how to handle the fact that, when Danny had dropped to the floor after the gunshot had gone off in that building, Steve's heart had stopped beating, and his life, minus Danny, had flashed before his eyes. It was dismal, and lonely, and no way in hell was Danny going to sleep on the couch tonight, or any other night in the near or distant future.

"I love you. I love your kids," Steve said. "They're always welcome in _our_ home."

"Thank you for that, babe," Danny said, voice thick, eyes filling with tears.

"C'mon, let's get some shuteye, we'll talk in the morning." Steve was suddenly exhausted, his head pounding out a punishing rhythm.

Still, once they'd made it up to the room that they'd been sharing for several months, going on a year now, Steve helped Danny out of his ruined shirt, tried not to let the fact that he couldn't tell how much of the blood that stained it was Danny's, and how much of it belonged to the man that he'd arrested, bother him. He ran his fingers gingerly over the bruises that covered Danny's torso, reminded himself that the reason he could do so was because Danny was alive, that he hadn't died in that dark hallway, the victim of a raging lunatic.

And when they laid down together, Danny on his side, head resting on Steve's chest, arm flung out across his stomach, foot nestled in between his calves, Steve wrapped his arms around Danny, held him close, breathed in the scent of cologne and sweat, reveled in the headiness of it, and in the fact that Danny was alive, lightly snoring as he fell asleep, safe and sound, with Steve's fingers running through his hair.

Kissing the top of Danny's head, Steve followed Danny down into sleep. Banishing fears of his partner's near death from his mind, he replaced them with images of what he hoped was to come in a future with his partner by his side. Their first Christmas as a family. Wedding bells. Sharing an umbrella in the rain...


End file.
